年12個重大科學時刻
1. World Health Organisation declares a public emergency of international concern over Zika
世界衛生組織宣佈寨卡構成國際關注的公共衛生緊急事件
1 February
2月1日
In global health, 2016 will be remembered as the year a little known virus made a major impact. It felt strangely familiar, but this time it wasn't Ebola making headlines around the world, it was Zika - a mosquito-borne virus being linked to a huge spike in the number of babies in Brazil born with brain defects.
因爲一種鮮爲人知的病毒所造成的重大影響，2016年將在全球衛生方面被人們銘記。這似曾相識，不過此次登上全球頭條新聞的不是埃博拉病毒，而是寨卡——一種通過蚊子傳播的病毒，大腦存在缺陷的新生兒數量在巴西急劇增加與此有關。
World Health Organisation declared that the cluster of microcephaly cases and other neurological disorders were a public health emergency of international concern, it was a rallying cry for the international community to respond.
世界衛生組織宣佈小頭症及其他神經系統紊亂疾病的爆發構成國際關注的公共衛生緊急事件，呼籲國際社會聯手應對。
eX demonstrates a big step towards fully reusable space craft
美國太空探索技術公司在航天器充分回收方面取得重大進展
8 April
4月8日
It was an incredible achievement for SpaceX. The first stage rocket of one of its Falcon 9 launchers, having successfully lofted cargo to the International Space Station, managed to turn itself around, bleed off the enormous kinetic energy it had acquired while its main engines were burning, fly back down to Earth and land vertically - with balletic precision - on a rather tiny looking robotic barge floating somewhere in the Atlantic.
美國太空探索技術公司取得了一項令人難以置信的成就。“獵鷹9號”發射器的一級火箭在成功將貨物運送到國際空間站後，能夠自主轉向，釋放了主發動機燃燒提供的巨大動能，飛回地球並垂直降落在漂浮在大西洋上的一艘相當小的自動駁船上，極其精準。
3. Portugal is entirely powered by renewable energy for four days
葡萄牙完全使用可再生能源供電四天
7-11 May
5月7日-11日
Moving away from fossil fuels to renewable energy is surely the most important engineering and scientific challenge of our age.
從化石燃料轉向可再生能源，無疑是我們這個時代最重要的工程挑戰和科學挑戰。
Portugal's achievement gives governments and energy companies a tangible example of how it can and does work, and why they should be investing in solar, wind, wave and other renewable technologies now.
葡萄牙的成就說明這種轉變是可行的，它爲各國政府和能源公司提供了一個實實在在的範例，也告訴他們爲什麼現在應該投資太陽能、風能、波浪能和其他可再生技術。
4. New reserves of helium discovered
儲氦新發現
28 June
6月28日
In June this year, a collaboration between universities and industry announced that it had discovered a huge reserve of helium gas in Tanzania, using a new exploration technique.
今年六月，一項大學和工業界的合作宣佈，他們通過一種新的勘探技術在坦桑尼亞發現了一個儲量巨大的氦氣田。
5. Confirmation of the discovery of a nearby habitable planet
確認發現近地宜居行星
24 August
8月24日
The nearest star, Proxima Centauri, has a planet orbiting it not much bigger than Earth. Its "year" is only 11 days. But it's in the habitable zone because Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star about 100 times fainter than the sun. And there's hot news that a similar star, 40 light years away, may have three planets in its habitable zone.
有一顆大小與地球相近的行星圍繞着距離太陽最近的恆星——半人馬座比鄰星運轉。這顆行星的“一年”僅有11天。但因爲比鄰星是一顆紅矮星，它比太陽暗100倍左右，因此行星位於宜居區。另一則熱門消息稱，40光年外的一顆相似恆星的宜居區可能存在三顆行星。
6. Our last universal common ancestor gets a makeover
對“最後的共同祖先”的認識發生了改觀
25 July
7月25日
7. The legacy of a celebrated neuroscientist is contested
一位著名神經學家的遺作引發的爭議
7 August
8月7日
In 1953, Patient HM had experimental brain surgery that left him with striking amnesia. Decades of subsequent research with HM by neuropsychologist Suzanne Corkin made a major contribution to our understanding of memory.
1953年，病人HM因接受腦部實驗手術患上了嚴重的健忘症。通過對HM進行數十年的後續研究，神經心理學家蘇珊娜•科金在人類對記憶的認識方面做出了重大貢獻。
Corkin died this year but shortly after, journalist Luke Dittrich published a book claiming Corkin buried inconvenient findings, shredded files, and acted unethically in gaining HM's consent.
科金今年去世不久後，記者盧克• 迪特里希出版了一本書，聲稱科金掩埋不利發現，撕毀文件，並且用不道德的方式取得了HM的同意。
8. Greenland sharks live for a very long time
格陵蘭鯊活得很久
11 August
8月11日
On our increasingly human-dominated planet we can still learn much from the lives of other species. The discovery this year that the Greenland shark lives for 400 years, making it the longest-living vertebrate, puts our hectic lives into perspective.
在這個越來越爲人類所主宰的星球上，我們仍然可以從其他物種身上學習到很多東西。格陵蘭鯊魚可存活400年，是世界上最長壽的脊椎動物，這一發現讓人類重新審視自己忙碌的人生。
9. CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere passes 400 parts per million
地球大氣中的二氧化碳濃度超過了百萬分之400個單位
28 September
9月28日
10. A bad marriage can lead to an early death
糟糕的婚姻會導致早逝
1 October
10月1日
This research involves a large longitudinal study of emotion in interactions within married couples.
這項研究需要對夫妻互動時的情緒進行龐大的縱向研究。
Scientists get couples into the lab and looking at their stress levels while they have “difficult” conversations, finding that couples that deal with stress with positive emotions like laughter become less stressed, and tend to stay together for longer.
科學家們讓夫妻進入實驗室，在他們開始“彆扭”對話時觀察他們的壓力水平。研究發現，面對壓力時，用大笑等積極情緒緩解壓力的夫妻在一起的時間往往更久。
This year they looked at the use of negative strategies such as anger or stonewalling responses to conflict, and found that these predicted health-related changes over time in specific ways.
今年，科學家們研究了對衝突表現出憤怒、拖延的消極策略，他們發現，久而久之這些反應會以某些特定方式預示與健康相關的變化。
11. Arctic and Antarctic sea ice volumes both fall to an all-time low
北極和南極海冰量均降至歷史最低水平
17 November
11月17日
12. Scientists modify photosynthesis to boost crop yield
科學家改良光合作用提高作物產量
18 November
11月18日
Last month scientists at Illinois University made a breakthrough that could herald a second green revolution for world agriculture – they improved the efficiency of photosynthesis, the process by which plants turn sunlight into the biomass that is the source of all our food.
伊利諾伊大學的科學家們上個月取得的突破性進展預示着全球農業將迎來第二次綠色革命——他們提高了光合作用的效率，這是植物將陽光轉化爲生物量的過程，也是人類所有食物的來源。
